Staying up late, listening to Mahler, was no way to live. Jonathan's nightly routine was to turn out the lights, put a single lighted candle in the middle of the room, and let the dark music wash over him in waves. It was an affectation, something he did because he enjoyed it and there was no one there to stop him. For an hour or so, he closed his eyes and his soul sang along with the brooding music's power. Then, far too late, he went to sleep. And the next day, life beat him down again.
Finally, one day, his mother died. She was the last one who actually talked to him, who knew him without judging him. Her voice could no longer calm him when he suffered the nicks and cuts of everyday life. She no longer filled his holidays with thoughtful cards and familiar, delicious food. His mother was gone, and he was alone, absolutely.
His lonely moments grew bitter. The thoughts of suicide that had flitted at the edges of his consciousness grew more insistent, more real. Instead of vague fantasies about what it would be like when he was gone, instead of idly pondering who, if anyone, would sign the guest book at his funeral, he began to plan, to contemplate when and how.
Jonathan chose as the date the eve of his fortieth birthday, the symbolic end of his youth. Really, the choice was made because the date was close at hand, and he did not want to be as pathetic a forty-something as he was a thirty-something.
His method was absolute, and sure. He did not want to wake up in a hospital with some stranger in a blue, disposable uniform telling him that science had brought him back from the edge of death. No, he squeezed himself into his bathtub and put the business end of a shotgun between his teeth and pulled the trigger. In an instant, he too was gone from life.
The next, timeless moment, however, revealed some nasty truths. First, he discovered that his consciousness had survived, despite what he had done to his body. There was life after death. Second, he felt the presence of the vast super-consciousness that was the Creator. And third, he discovered to his horror that this Creator would not reward this little man for prematurely ending the life that the Creator had bequeathed him. Though he had lived a clean and otherwise honorable life, Heaven did not open its pearly gates to him. He would not be allowed to die, not until God was finished with him.
Thus began the story of a fallen soul.
* * * * *
She woke with a start, uncertain of where she was. She lay spread-eagled on her back, her wrists and ankles bound to the metal frame of a bed. Dried spittle traced lines down from the corner of her mouth. The room, bright white with large fluorescent light fixtures in the ceiling, smelled of the remnants of urine and barf, mixed in with the odor of the industrial strength disinfectant used to clean it up.
Her mind swirled, trying to gather the details of her surroundings through hazy senses. She blinked to clear the fog from her sight. A hospital room? No, it was too dirty, and no medical equipment was in sight. But she was wearing a patient's white robe, and a blue plastic identity band around her left wrist. Her body appeared to her thin and shriveled, far smaller than she remembered.
Her memory, too, was fragmented. She remembered trying to kill herself, remembered the taste of the cold steel of a shotgun in her mouth. She remembered willing her finger to pull the trigger to end her life. But for some reason, she had failed. She knew that from the bite of the leather straps as they held her in limbs in place. She knew it from the unpleasant odors that she smelled with each rasping, dry-throated breath that she inhaled. She was alive, and she knew that those who had bound her to this bed would not let her try to kill herself again.
Then, as she searched her memory, she realized there was one very important detail missing--her name. What was her name? Her brow furrowed with the effort to remember something so basic, yet so elusive.
Finally, in her frustration, she blurted the question out loud. "Dammit, what's my name?" Her voice rang harshly throughout the room.
A deep, male voice answered. "Your name was Jonathan. Your name is now Angelina." There was a low, malicious chuckle.
Angelina could not see who was speaking. She craned her head from side to side, trying to locate the speaker. But the door was closed and the tiny, rectangular room appeared empty.
In a timid tone, she asked, "Hello? Who's there?"
The disembodied voice replied, "I and my identity will remain a mystery to you for now, my dear." The voice grew quiet and more uncertain. "At least, until I discover who has taken my Angelina away from me and given her to you. And, more importantly, why." There was a rustling sound behind the head of the bed. "Until we meet again, here is a little something to remember me by."
The room suddenly chilled, and a shadow passed between Angelina's face and the ceiling light. A wave of revulsion swept through her as the presence dipped toward her face. She twisted against the bindings that held her, resisting its approach. The shadow brushed her lips with any icy, nauseating touch that caused her stomach to dry-heave and her throat to gag. She retched, gasping for air.
Then, in the next instant, the presence was gone. The pressure around Angelina's chest vanished, and her breathing steadied into deep heaves as she drew fresh air into her lungs. The room recovered its warmth, and she again heard the low whir of the ventilation fan over her bed.
As she recovered her composure, she could not understanding what had just happened. Time passed in the windowless room, and confused thoughts swirled through her mind. Angelina? The voice said that was her name, but it did not seem right. The other name, though, was more familiar. Jonathan. She recognized it, but she could not place when she had heard it before.
A door opened behind her and light footsteps approached. A black woman in a white nurse's uniform leaned over her, scowling. "Quiet today, huh? That's unusual for you, you little bitch." Her voice was full of contempt. She began to adjust and straighten out the sheets on the bed, tugging at them as if she cared more about the wrinkles in the fabric than the patient strapped to the bed.
Angelina frowned. Why did this woman dislike her so much? What had Angelina ever done to her? She could not remember. Angelina tried to speak, but at first her throat was too dry. Finally, she managed to croak, "I'm sorry."
That stopped the nurse. She said, "Sorry? I didn't think you knew that word. At least, I've never heard you apologize before."
Angelina shook her head, swallowing to moisten her mouth and throat. She whispered, "Before? I don't know what you mean. We've never met."
The nurse stared at Angelina for a moment. Then, more to herself than her patient, she said, "I'm going to get Doctor Davis."
Angelina listened to the nurse shuffle out the door, then flexed her wrists and ankles, testing the leather straps binding her to the bed. She mumbled, "Okay. I'll wait here."
* * * * *
An hour later, Angelina was sitting on the edge of her bed, a thermometer wedged underneath her tongue. Doctor Davis, a balding middle-aged man wearing a white robe and a stethoscope around his neck, looked at his patient with wary curiosity. "You know," he told her as he pulled the thermometer from her mouth, "this is the first time I've evaluated you without you trying to stab me with whatever you could get your hands on."
Angelina shrugged. That did not sound like anything she would do. "I don't remember."
Doctor Davis pulled a small flashlight from his shirt pocket and checked each of her eyes, then the inside of her mouth. "In fact," he continued softly, "I don't ever remember you ever being this calm. How do you feel?"
"Fine, I guess," she replied, her fingers aimlessly tugging at a loose strand of her wild head of sandy hair. "I mean, I'm not in pain or anything. I just feel real dirty, like I haven't taken a shower in ages." She crinkled her nose in disgust.
Doctor Davis nodded. "Yes, my dear. You do smell rather badly. But that's what happens when you are a bad girl and we have to strap you to the bed. And, Angelina, you have been very naughty during your stay here."
Angelina gazed up at him in disbelief. "Really? What do you mean?"
The doctor's brow furrowed. "Don't you know?"
Angelina shook her head. "No. What have I done?"
Doctor Davis took a deep breath. He looked at the nurse standing behind him for help, but she only shook her head back at him. He turned back to his patient. "Well, let's start with what you do know. What do you remember?"
She frowned as she concentrated. "Actually, I don't remember very much at all. I remember putting the barrel of a gun in my mouth. I thought I pulled the trigger. Then, the next thing I knew I was here And this voice, this man I didn't recognize, told me my name was Angelina." She shook her head. "No, actually, he told me I used to be called Jonathan, then he said I am now Angelina. Which doesn't make sense. Then, he was gone. The next thing that happened was the nurse came." She gestured toward the nurse, who actually flinched as Angelina's eyes met hers. "Then, she went and got you."
Doctor Davis frowned, and his tone grew more insistent. "What else? Do you know why you're in here?"
She looked up into his face, and uncertainty crept into her voice. "Because I tried to kill myself?" The corner of her lips twisted into a nervous smile, hoping that she had given the right answer.
The nurse in the corner made a derisive snort, but the doctor ignored her. He straightened and said, "No, you're in here because you killed your parents and brother. Because a judge said you were legally insane, and not responsible for your actions. Frankly, this moment, I agreed with that diagnosis."
That stunned Angelina. "No, no," she protested, "I didn't kill my parents! That's impossible!" She held her head in her hands as she searched her mind for memories that seemed just out of reach. "Plus, I don't think I ever had a brother."
"No, I assure you that is why you are here," the doctor insisted. "And this man who spoke to you? Who was it?"
Angelina shrugged, her voice distant. "I don't know. He seemed to know me, though. I thought you could tell me."
Doctor Davis turned toward the nurse. "Was anyone else in here, Nurse?"
She stepped forward. "No, absolutely not, Doctor. I was at my station all morning, and the key to this room was there the whole time. I came in to check her bindings, and she was looking at me with this strange expression."
The doctor asked, "Strange?"
"Yes," she answered. "It was the first time Angelina didn't look like a crazed animal. She looked up at me, well, almost like she was normal."
Their patient interrupted. "What are you people talking about? I don't know what you think, but I'm not a nut."
Together, they turned back to face her. They stared for a moment, until the doctor broke the silence. "We don't use the word 'nut' around here," he said. "But it appears you do need to be reevaluated over the next few days." He patted Angelina on the shoulder. "Until then, do you think you can be a good girl? Nurse Judy here will get you cleaned up. We can talk again tomorrow."
The eyes of the two women met, and the nurse grimaced in distaste of her patient. Doctor Davis left the room, leaving them alone.
After an uncomfortable moment of silence, Nurse Judy said, "Alright, you heard the doctor. Let's go." She grabbed a towel and a fresh white patient's robe from the top of a nearby dresser, then herded Angelina toward the door. They entered the hallway, and Nurse Judy grabbed Angelina by the upper arm with a tight grip to lead her toward the showers.
The others in the hallway, female patients and staff, parted as they passed. Some looked at Angelina with undisguised hatred, others with wide-eyed fear. Angelina stared back at them. She did not recognize any of them, or this place.
They reached the communal showers, and Nurse Judy halted Angelina. "Wait one second," the nurse commanded. She swung open the door, and Angelina could hear water flowing in the large tiled room around the corner. Nurse Judy called out, "Ladies, wrap it up! Angelina's going to take a shower!"
There were a couple of surprised gasps from the interior room, and the sound of the water ended abruptly. After a moment, two middle-aged women appeared, with towels loosely covering the front of their bodies. Drops and wet hair matted against their heads appeared, one with soap suds still on her arms. Neither looked at Angelina as they hustled out into the hallway. Angelina could not understand why they were so afraid of her. She did not even know them.
Angelina walked slowly in the first room, an open, white-tiled washroom with a row of sinks, the air thick with warm moisture and the smell of shampoo and soap. The large mirrors were fogged over, moisture condensing into thin streamers that dripped in thin lines down to the counter. Angelina paused for a moment to look at the faint, blurred outline of herself in a mirror, but could only see the broad outlines of her thin body and her colors--the dirty blond of the hair around her head, and the gray of her hospital blouse. She felt a twinge of curiosity. Strange, she thought, she could not remember what she looked like.
But the other image in the mirror closed the distance quickly between them. Angelina felt Nurse Judy's hands press into the small of her back. Nurse Judy growled, "Come on, missy, get on with it. I've got other things to do today."
Angelina took a few halting steps forward, reaching the opening into the shower room. She stopped and faced Nurse Judy, and her cheeks flushed with her embarrassment. Was she supposed to take off her clothes in front of this woman? That did not seem right. She opened her mouth to object, but the glare from Nurse Judy's eyes stopped her. Angelina gulped, her throat suddenly dry.
Well, Angelina thought, if she had to take a shower, she would. She loosened the knot on the cord which held her loose-fitting sweat pants around her waist. She slipped the fabric from around her hips, letting the pants drop to the floor, leaving behind only tight-fitting white panties. Her fingers gingerly released the buttons down the front of her blouse, then twisted her shoulders to slide it from her arms. It plopped on the floor behind her.
That left a bra behind, a simple white bra with shoulder straps, but Angelina stared down at it as if it were some alien creature wrapped around her body. For a moment, she tugged at it, unsure of how to remove it.
Nurse Judy groaned, "Oh, for heavens sake!" She reached behind Angelina and unclasped the bra's fastener. "I swear you enjoy tormenting me."
The straps slid from Angelina's shoulders and the bra joined the other clothes on the tiled floor. Angelina was too distracted to reply, staring down at the curves of her breasts. They looked natural enough, round and full as appropriate to the young woman she was, but they looked out of place to Angelina, as if they belonged to someone else and it was wrong for her to be appraising her own body.
After a few moments, Nurse Judy finally coughed her impatience. Angelina started and flushed with embarrassment, suddenly remembering that she was not alone. Only her panties remained, and this time Angelina held her chin up as she inserted her fingers into the waistband and slid them down the length of her legs. She stepped out of them and used the tip of a toe to lift the panties onto the pile of the other clothes. The mystery of what the removal of the panties had revealed would have to wait until later.
Angelina felt her nakedness, shivering in the mix of the humid warmth of the shower room and the cold, fresh air drifting in through the doorway behind her. But she did not have more than a couple of seconds to hesitate before she felt the firm hand of Nurse Judy press into the small of her back. Angelina stepped through the threshold into the shower room.
The room itself was normal enough, with a row of shower heads and pairs of hot and cold knobs jutting out from the wall, and thin half-partitions between each stall. Angelina walked over to one of the middle stalls, which had a small tube of shampoo and a sudsy bar of soap on a small metal rack. Holding herself out of the line of the showerhead, she turned on the water and adjusted the knobs until the temperature of the spray on the back of her hand felt warm and inviting.
Finally, Angelina turned her face upwards toward the water pulsing from the showerhead, and stepped into the spray. The water enveloped her, soaking into her hair and running down her face and over her shoulders into the creases of her body. After enjoying the sensation for a few seconds, she picked up the tube of shampoo and squeezed a small dab into the palm of one hand, then began to rub the shampoo into the stringy strands of her hair. After rinsing the suds out, she picked up the soap and made a thick lather in the palms of her hands. She continued to clean herself, starting with her face and moving down her body and limbs. Soon, she felt the grunge and oil and funk that had coated her body washing away, as if she were sloughing off a dead outer shell, leaving virgin skin and a new body behind. Angelina closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensations that swept over and through her. The simple act of taking a shower had taken on the power of a baptismal, and rapture filled her soul. In her cleaning the filth from herself, Angelina was reborn.
Finally, a voice behind her grated with impatience. "Okay, Okay. Don't start getting off, sister. Not with me watching." It was only when Nurse Judy reasserted her presence that reality rushed back to Angelina--the sound of water spattering on the tile, the sensation of the droplets raining on her head, the sound of the overhead ventilator fan trying to cleanse the dense air from the room. Reluctantly, Angelina twisted the knobs closed, and her moment was over.
Angelina folded her arms across her chest, hiding her nakedness as she turned to face Nurse Judy. She flinched as a towel arced across the distance between them, landing on Angelina's right shoulder. Gingerly, Angelina began to dab the moisture from her face, and awkwardly rubbed water from her skin under Nurse Judy's watchful glare. In contrast to the warm glow she had felt only moments before, now, in the harsh light of Nurse Judy's eyes, Angelina felt tiny, frail and alone.
Soon, Angelina had been wrapped within a thin, smooth cotton robe that barely covered her torso, and her bare feet were padding down the hallway back to her room. She had no regrets about living the filthy clothes that had covered her behind in the shower room, but what she had on then felt paper thin as she walked among the strangers who parted to let her pass. Self-conscious, she kept her head down and avoided their eyes, letting Nurse Judy's hands push her this way and that until the door to her room clanged shut behind her, and she was alone again.
The old sheets to her bed had been removed and a new pile sat waiting on the mattress. Angelina remade her bed, then plucked out new underwear and a blouse and sweatpants, bland but clean, from the dresser. She redressed, then crawled between the sheets to recover warmth back into her limbs. At last, she closed her eyes, and sleep came to her.
Time passed and night fell, taking the light from Angelina's room. No clock was there to measure the moment when her slumber ended and her eyes fluttered open, greeted by an empty blackness. As the fog of sleep faded from her mind, she became aware of an unpleasant, sickly odor. For a moment, she wondered if it was an echo of her own former, foul stench, but a twist of her head pressed a strand of her hair between her nose and the pillow. The hair smelled clean, with a trace of shampoo. No, it was not her, but it was a familiar, though foul, smell.
As if in answer to her confusion, a dark, disembodied male voice echoed in the room. "Greetings, my dear. I see you've been scrubbed and gotten some clean clothes. That should help you in your new situation."
A bolt of fear shot down Angelina's spine. It was the voice that had spoken to her hours earlier, when she had been still bound to the bed frame. She demanded in a high, breathy tone, "Who are you? What do you want?"
The voice chuckled, a low laugh that clearly enjoyed her fright and confusion. "Believe it or not, I am your friend--the only one who can tell you who you truly are, and what you are doing in this place. These are questions, I believe, that have, or will, be troubling your pretty little head. Am I right?"
Friend? Angelina doubted that, instinctively distrusting the speaker. But the voice was correct. Everything that had happened that day seemed too new, almost as if she had only begun to live her life within the past twenty-four hours. That did not seem possible. After all, she could speak English (and knew she could read and write, even if she had not done it yet). She knew Nurse Judy was a nurse, and Doctor Davis was a doctor, and what those roles meant. She knew the shame of being dirty and of being naked, that she needed to be clean and clothed to be a good girl. No new-born babe would know any of this. It would take years of learning, even if she could not remember it.
And, most important, Angelina knew she was insane. She had to be. That was why she was a patient in mental hospital. That was why everyone she had met either loathed or was afraid of her. She did not doubt the justice of her confinement. She must be a very sick person, even though she could not remember the things she had done.
Still, it was uncomfortable for her to have this strange man in her room knowing more about her than she did herself. At last, in a quiet, almost timid voice, she answered, "My name is Angelina. I'm a patient in a mental hospital."
In reply, the other was angry, impatient. "Yes, yes. Your full name is Angelina Maria Hernandez. But I was the first to tell you your new name, remember? It was easy enough to guess the rest." There was a pause, and Angelina felt the presence gather itself within the darkness, draw itself closer to her. The foul stench in her nostrils grew more intense. Angelina drew the sheets closer to herself and coiled her body into a tight little ball. She was afraid.
When the voice spoke again, it was only inches from her face. "The real mystery is this--not who you are, but who you were. Who were you before you came to be Angelina?"
But she already knew the answer. The voice had told her that, too. In a whisper, she said, "Jonathan. You said I used to be Jonathan." She spoke the name quietly, because some instinct told her that was a secret that she should not have known.
"That's right," the voice said, its command restored. "Your name used to be Jonathan Anthony. You died on the eve of your fortieth birthday. What else do you remember about your former life?"
"Nothing," she lied. She could not repeat what she had told Doctor Davis of her memory of the cold steel of a gun in her mouth and of her act of pulling the trigger. It was part of some great crime, though she could not recall the other particulars. But the memory was seared on her soul as if she were branded by it for life.
The presence, for its part, did not call her on her lie, even though she sensed it already knew the truth. "All right, then. What of the present? How did you get to be here?"
Despite her fear, Angelina began to get angry. She knew the voice was toying with her. "I don't know. You're so smart, you tell me."
The voice mocked her with his low laughter. "As you wish, my dear. You are what some humans refer to as a 'walk-in'. The soul that used to inhabit that body, the real Angelina, was my pet. In her early teens, she was diagnosed by a so-called psychiatrist as being a paranoid schizophrenic. After all, she was hearing a voice, one that was telling her to do things she otherwise would not do as a nice young girl. Her first doctor gave her medication which helped her to ignore my demands. Then, about two years ago, when she was seventeen, she felt well enough to stop taking her pills. I returned to her life, and I was again her mentor and she was the pupil."
As the voice went on, Angelina felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She could not imagine this malicious entity, whomever or whatever it was, having control of anyone. But she stayed silent as the thing continued.
It spoke slowly, relishing its tale. "Then, one day, I tested her fidelity. I commanded her to kill her brother. And she did, stabbing him with a butcher knife while he peeled an orange over the kitchen sink. When her mother found them and tried to call the police, my little Angelina killed her as well. Later, her father returned home from work, and she drove the knife into his back as he was taking off his jacket in the living room. And it was all perfectly sensible to her at the time, because I had told her to do it."
The empty, black silence that followed was almost more frightening than hearing the voice speak. After a moment, Angelina asked in a timid whisper, "Then what happened?"
"Well," the voice answered, "I had promised my dear Angelina that no harm would come to her, that she would be taken care of for the rest of her life if she did as I asked. And I was right. She was insane, you see, not responsible for her actions. All the doctors agreed. So, they placed her in here until she was well, or for the rest of her life. Which amounted to the same thing."
Angelina was horrified. This voice, this evil thing, had murdered three people and ruined the life of a young girl. Strangely, though, she believed every word. It sounded like the truth, and Doctor Davis had already told her a much shorter version of the story. She had to know the answer to another question. "But I didn't do any of that," she insisted. "I know that in my heart. What happened to the real Angelina?"
"Gone, forever," it replied. It actually sounded sad, if that were possible. "She has been taken from me, replaced by you. That is a walk-in. Your soul has been placed into Angelina's body, to live out the rest of her life."
Angelina grew indignant. "Well, if you think I'm going to be your puppet, you can stop right now. There's no way I would ever let someone like you tell me what to do!"
The voice sounded resigned. "I know. That is the point. You are more independent than Angelina ever was. In fact, it was a rash act of selfishness on your part that led to your current state."
That startled Angelina. "Rash act? What do you mean?"
"Your suicide, of course. Come now. You know exactly what I am talking about."
Angelina did, though she did not want to admit it. The gun in her mouth, the act of pulling the trigger, was her only memory of her former life. She simply could not remember the inevitable outcome of doing such a thing.
Tears welled in her eyes, and she began to cry. As the enormity of what she had done finally began to sink in, her sobs became more intense, and her breaths came in short, hard coughs as she wept into her pillow.
And only the voice in the night was there to hear her sorrow. Finally, it grew bored, and it left Angelina to drown in her own misery.
* * * * *
Over the next few weeks, Angelina gradually made up her mind to break out of the mental hospital. It was not her first impulse. As she tried to figure out who and where she was, she tried to be nice. She wanted the people at the hospital--the doctors, the staff, the other patients--to stop being afraid of her. She did what she was told, went where the authority figures told her to go, and Angelina smiled in meek submission the whole time. In her heart, she knew she was a good, kind person, and everyone else would realize that, eventually.
But the voice that visited her in the night kept reminding her that she was merely a fake Angelina, an ex-middle aged man wrapped within a young girl's body. She tried not to listen, waving the voice away is it were a bee buzzing around her head, trying to ward it off before she felt its sting. She instinctively distrusted it--it was a malicious, nauseating spirit that hid in the shadows, and Angelina knew without having to be told that it had preyed on others before her. She could not trust anything it said to her.
Yet the truth of one thing the voice had told her became all too obvious. The decision-makers in the hospital would never let her leave, ever. In her talks with Doctor Davis, Angelina kept insisting that she was much better, that she was calm and in control of herself, that she wouldn't hurt a fly. Then, Doctor Davis would gently remind her of the disembodied voice that haunted her, that she believed she had been a man who committed suicide only to wind up as a female Hispanic mental patient.
She never denied these things; after all, Angelina was the one who told Doctor Davis about them. She did have to admit to herself, though, that when Doctor Davis repeated her assertions back to her they sounded like the ramblings of, well, a crazy person. It would not be hard for him to imagine that she was still the same wild, truly insane killer of three people. But this Angelina truly was a different person, and she needed professional psychiatric help. "Please," she would beg over and over in their sessions, "Please believe me. Help me understand what's happening to me!"
But Doctor Davis would only cock an eyebrow and lean back into his overstuffed leather chair. "Well, for one thing," he would say in a stuffy, officious tone, "keep taking your medications. And if you keep yourself under control--as you have been--we may start lifting some of the restrictions and give you freer access to the rest of the ward. We'll speak again in a couple of days." Then, Angelina would be escorted back to her tiny room and the door locked behind her. She was alone, at least until the voice visited again.
Then, one night when her spirits were especially low, she felt the familiar sick feeling in her stomach that announced the presence of the voice in the empty blackness of her room. This time, she began the conversation. "Get me out of here," Angelina said.
She could almost feel the voice grinning back at her. "What's this, my dear? Are you actually asking for my help?"
"Yeah," she answered, "I'm fed up with this place. I want out." The spirit's reply was a low, malicious laugh.
Angelina continued, "This is ridiculous. I'm stuck in here for something I didn't do."
The voice sounded sympathetic. "Yes, that is a shame, truly. But tell me, where will you go? What will you do?"
"Live my life," she said. "Do the best I can. Just like everyone else."
"Come now, my dear. You do not expect to merely walk out of here and blend in with the rest of the world."
Angelina shook her head. "No, probably not. But if I stay in here I really will go crazy. So, can you help me?"
The voice took on a hard, cold tone. "Of course, little one, out of respect for the memory of my beloved Angelina. Your wish is my command."
And the presence was gone. Angelina sat on the edge of the bed, shivering with anxiety. What was the bargain that she had just made?
A few minutes later, the presence returned. "All right, my dear. You may go."
Angelina started. "Just like that?"
The voice answered matter-of-factly, "Yes, the way is clear."
Angelina swallowed to clear her suddenly dry throat. She stood and slipped her toes into a pair of hospital slippers, then shuffled toward the door. As she walked, she felt the presence move with her, falling in behind her.
She reached for the door. It should have been locked; it always had been. But this time, when Angelina pulled on the handle, the door slid smoothly inwards. Angelina stared at the open doorway in disbelief.
Finally, Angelina leaned forward and peeked out into the hallway. It was empty, and eerily quiet. She knew it was the middle of the night, but even in the early hours there were always attendants on duty. This time, though, Angelina did not see anyone.
To the left, there was an open area with several chairs and a couch facing a television. The set was on, tuned to a cable news channel, but the volume was turned off. Angelina crept forward and peered over the top of the sofa. A female nurse was sleeping soundly, curled up on the cushions. Angelina smiled. She gently lifted the white nurse's hat off the sleeping woman and placed it on her head.
Her smile widened into a Cheshire-cat grin. She whispered, "I think I know how to get out of here." The presence, unseen in the glare of the fluorescent lights, smiled with her.
* * * * *
An hour later, Angelina was fully clothed in a white nurse's uniform she had found in a staff room, and driving in the sleeping nurse's car, heading toward the front gate of the hospital. The nurse's name was Michelle Henderson. Angelina knew that from the purse she had stolen from the attendant's station. Angelina felt sorry for taking the purse, Nurse Henderson's hospital security card, and her car. But Angelina needed those things to get away, and she planned to write a polite note apologizing to Nurse Henderson, once she was safely gone.
At that moment, though, a nervous knot in her gut threatened to unload the contents of her stomach. She was doing her best to look the part of a nurse heading home at the end of a shift, but the straggly hair dangling out from beneath her hat and her wild eyes would have given her away during the day. It was a cool night, but perspiration gathered on her forehead. She wondered whether she was supposed to speak to the guard at the gate, whether she needed to show an identification card. That would not help either, because she, a teenage Hispanic, certainly did not look anything like the middle-aged African-American woman in the photo.
But there was no other way. She had to bluff her way through the gate, without attracting attention to herself. Otherwise--well, Angelina did not dwell on what would happen then. In her heart, she was not a violent person, but somebody was going to get hurt.
The car, a small economy car with a tired, rattling engine, glided forward toward the front gate. To the side, there was a small, glassed booth lighted by a yellowish overhead lamp. The guard, a paunchy overweight rent-a-cop well past his prime, was reclining backwards in a chair, his chin resting against his chest. Was he asleep? Angelina could not tell.
As the car rolled up, though, the man seemed to stir. Angelina's breath caught in her throat. She fumbled for the identification card clipped to her blouse pocket. Her fingers finally grasped it, and Angelina pressed it up against the drivers window, placing it between the guard and her face. She braked to slow the car, but she was not going to come to a complete stop if she did not have to. She held her breath, waiting for his reaction.
The guard's brow furrowed in confusion, and he glanced at his watch. Angelina felt a chill run up the length of her spine. Angelina realized he was not expecting someone to be leaving at that hour. He leaned forward, letting the chair plant itself on the floor, and stood up. Angelina hurriedly put the identification card down. She hoped he had not seen the picture.
The guard slid open the door to the booth and motioned for Angelina to stop the car. As she rolled down the car window, Angelina swallowed to clear her suddenly dry throat.
The guard nodded down at her, but his tone was less than friendly. "Evening, miss. Leaving early, are we?"
Angelina managed a weak smile. She answered in a high, tense little girl's voice, "Yes, sir. I don't feel well, so I'm going home before the end of my shift."
He stared at her with no trace of sympathy, but did not seem overly suspicious. He tilted his head to look into the dark interior of the car, first in the back seat then returning to stare silently at Angelina.
The silence grew more uncomfortable by the second. Angelina tried quickly to think of something to say. "I, um. . . Uh, I'm sorry to have woken you up."
The guard's face hardened into a sour grimace. His voice grated when he spoke, "May I see your identification card, miss?"
Suddenly, Angelina knew the game was up. One look at the picture and she knew the guard would know what was happening. Her hand was trembling as she stretched out her arm to hand the guard the nurse's ID. But as he lifted his fingers to take the card from her hand, Angelina let it fall to the ground.
She feigned surprise. "Ooh. I'm sorry!"
The guard growled, then bent over to retrieve it. As he did, Angelina jammed her foot on the car's accelerator. The motor hesitated for an instant, then caught. It revved hard, and the tiny front tires squealed as the car lurched forward. As it sped through the front gate of the hospital, Angelina glanced quickly in the rear view mirror. The guard had taken a couple of steps to chase after her, and his mouth was open, yelling something that Angelina could not hear. Angelina returned her gaze to the street ahead of her. There was no going back.
The neighborhood near the hospital was dirty but deserted, and the blocks went by as Angelina raced ahead. Even though she knew she only had moments before the guard had put the police on her trail, she felt exhilarated. She was free!
Then, she heard a rustling in the darkness in the rear seat, and sensed the familiar, nauseating presence of the disembodied voice even before it spoke. In an undisturbed, smooth tone, the voice spoke, "Brava! Well done, my dear! Granted, you would never have escaped your room but for me. But to reach this point is impressive."
Angelina's relief turned into sudden rage. "Your help. Please. Why wasn't the guard asleep?"
The voice chuckled. "Come now. You do not expect me to do everything for you, do you?"
"No," Angelina shot back. "But if you're going to keep pestering me, do more than just watch."
The voice laughed, a malicious giggle that mocked Angelina's anger. "Well, my dear, if you insist on my help, I offer it to you. Wholeheartedly."
As she focused on speeding ahead as fast as she dared, Angelina winced. The voice sounded a little too smug. But she also knew she needed help. Otherwise, her escape would turn into a very short trip.
Angelina said, "Alright, how about finding somewhere for me to hide? I can't race around like this for too much longer."
"True enough. And I have just the place." Angelina heard genuine amusement in the voice. Her instincts rang with alarm.
Even so, Angelina slowed the pace of her flight, and the voice directed her one way, then another. Soon, she was out of the poorer section of the city, heading into a better residential neighborhood. And, to that point, she had yet to see the flashing lights of a police cruiser. Perhaps, she thought, her luck would continue to hold.
Finally, the voice directed her to pull the car into the driveway of a darkened one-story white ranch house. As the headlights reflected from the garage door into her eyes, a shudder ran through Angelina. Even though the house was similar to the ones around it, and no different from other houses in the subdivision, this place in particular seemed oddly familiar to her. Why had the voice chosen this place?
But there was no time to follow through on that thought. Angelina asked quickly, "Is there anybody in there? Can I hide here?"
The voice was calm and unhurried as it answered. "Yes, my dear. No one has lived here for some months now, and the couple that bought it will not be here for another couple of weeks. In fact, the garage is empty and the side door is open. You can put the vehicle inside, if you wish." Angelina could hear the voice smiling as it finished. "Believe me. This place is perfect for you."
Angelina could only hope the voice was telling the truth. She quickly exited the car and ran inside the garage. After taking a few seconds in the darkness to locate the button for the opener, she succeeded in raising the large front door. She drove the car inside and shut it off, closing the door behind it.
Angelina exhaled her relief, grateful for the sudden silence. She gently closed the side door to the garage behind her and crossed the short distance to the facing side of the house. Angelina stood on a step and peered through one of the windows in the kitchen door.
The interior was silent and empty. There was no table and no chairs in the nook, and the countertops were bare of any appliances. There were bare spaces where a refrigerator and range would have stood, and a couple of the kitchen cabinets were open, as if someone had looked inside and not bothered to close them. Angelina nodded in satisfaction. So far, so good.
The first problem was how to get in without breaking anything. Angelina did not want to attract any more attention to herself from the neighbors than she already might have. But the door was locked.
She looked above the door and to each side, searching for any sign of a hidden key. The voice, she knew, was still with her, though it had gone strangely silent. She would have to find her own way inside.
Then, a thought occurred to her. The key was not right there by the door. It was in the back yard, hidden inside the lid of a bird feeder. She shook her head, wondering how she knew that. There was only one way to test the theory.
The light from the street spilled between the house and the garage, granting Angelina a thin lighted pathway into the back yard. She walked tentatively into the damp grass, her eyes looking for a small rectangular shape mounted at eye level on an iron pole. Then, to her right, she saw the darkened shape that she was looking for. It was a small wooden bird feeder with a peaked lid. It was empty of seeds, probably unfilled since the last person that had lived her had left. Angelina pushed the lid open, and retrieved a key from near the hinge--precisely where she thought it would be.
She returned to the kitchen door and the key smoothly unlocked the deadbolt. Angelina quickly entered, and carefully closed the door behind her.
For several seconds, Angelina stood there and held her breath, listening for any sounds. She did not completely trust the voice's assertion that the house was vacant, and she let her senses test the interior. But she heard no sounds, and her instincts betrayed no hint that anyone else was in the house. Except the voice, which Angelina knew was an unseen presence by her side.
At last, Angelina stepped further into the house, moving from the kitchen into the living room. The room was lighted through the front window by the lights shining in the street, making it bright enough to see. This room, too was empty of any furniture, even though the carpet showed still betrayed signs of where a couple of chairs, a coffee table, a home entertainment unit and a sofa had once rested. Strangely, Angelina could picture in her mind how the room had once looked, and she easily matched up the furniture in her mental image with the marks on the carpet.
Angelina kept moving, passing into a short hallway. Several doors opened onto the hallway--two bedrooms, one bathroom and a door leading to the basement.
For a moment, Angelina stood there, deciding which room to enter. The bathroom door stood open on her right, but even though she felt a slight urge to use the toilet, she stayed in the hallway. Of all the rooms around her, the bathroom was the one room that sent a foreboding chill through her. The darkness in there was particularly deep and frightening. She would wait until daylight before attempting to enter.
A less threatening room was the one next to the bathroom, the small rear bedroom. Angelina entered, but there was not enough light to see anymore than a couple of feet into the room. Still, Angelina decided that this would be her hiding place for the night.
She closed the door behind her and flipped on the wall switch. The ceiling light turned on, filling the room with a sudden, bright illumination. It took a couple of seconds for her eyes to adjust.
This room was also empty, with only marks in the carpet to show where the furniture had once stood. But Angelina had no trouble picturing the room as it once was. She imagined the full size bed and blue quilted comforter, the night stand on which had once rested an electric clock radio and standing lamp. On the other side, there had been a computer desk with a pullout keyboard drawer, and a small bookcase to its right. She could even imagine the pictures and plaques that had hung on the now-empty hooks on the wall.
For the first time, Angelina began to wonder about the ease with which these images had come to her. She began to be more certain that she had been to this house before. But when, she wondered.
She moved to the closet and slid open the louvered doors. The shelves were bare and only a couple of empty wire hangers dangled from the rod. Angelina's eyes wandered down to the closet floor.
It was a shoe box with a rubber band wrapped around it. It looked perfectly ordinary, but Angelina stared at it as if it were a coiled snake about to strike her. She wanted to reach down and take it, but was afraid to do it.
Suddenly the voice, which had never left her side, spoke softly in her ear. "Yes, my dear. Take it. No one wants what is in that box."
Angelina whispered in reply, "What do you mean?"
"Simply that anything of value has already been taken," the voice said. "That box contains only memories."
Angelina sank to the floor and tucked her legs underneath her. She gingerly lifted the shoebox and pulled off the rubber band. She took one final, deep breath, and lifted off the lid.
The box was full of photographs and slides, bundled together with thin rubber bands. Angelina picked one small stack and began sifting through the photos.
One was a thin, teenage boy with a beaming smile holding a black Labrador puppy. On the back of the photo, written in a careful feminine handwriting, was a date, "8/2/74". Another picture labeled "Xmas 1974" showed the boy in front of a decorated Christmas tree, with smiling parents on either side. The father was a graying, overweight man with a warm, friendly face wearing thick black plastic glasses; the mother was a short, younger woman with a round face and loving eyes.
Angelina wiped her face with the back of a hand as a tear began to trickle down her cheek. She kept flipping through the pictures, gently replacing each bundle as she moved through the rest of the shoe box. Her emotions swelled within her as she followed the progression of the young man through the succeeding years of photos--through high school, including the well-documented prom and graduation, through college, through his first job and first new car. And mixed in through it all were the boys parents, though at some point in the 1980s the pictures of the father stopped, and only the mother continued to appear. Finally, she stopped appearing as well, and finally the pictures themselves seemed to peter out and stop about the year 2000. By that time, Angelina was openly crying, her quiet sobs echoing softly within the bedroom.
Finally, she addressed the unseen voice. "Damn you. Why did you bring me here?"
The voice enjoyed its answer. "Well, my dear, you needed to hide. Why not take you to a place you felt comfortable in?"
Angelina's voice grew angry. "But this was Jonathan's house. I'm not Jonathan any more."
The voice was smug. "Come now. Weren't you the least bit curious about the man you used to be?"
Angelina replied loudly, "No!" Her voice softened. "I mean, yes, a little. But I never would have gone to the place where I had killed myself!" She stared at the wall that divided the bedroom from the bathroom and shuddered. For a moment, she could again taste the memory of gunmetal in her mouth.
Finally, she shouted at the voice. "Go away! Get lost!"
The voice chuckled its derision. "Careful, my precious. We are not alone."
Suddenly, Angelina remembered the brightness of the room. In a panic, she realized that there were no curtains on either of the rooms windows. Any nosy neighbor could see the light shining in the supposedly empty house.
Angelina quickly stood and turned off the light, then retreated into the open closet. She calmed her breath and listened, gripping a couple of the photos tightly in her right hand.
For a moment, she did not hear anything. Then, to her horror, she heard the quiet creaking of slow footsteps on the wooden floor of the hallway.
In desperation, she stood and glided across the room to the closest window. Switching the photos to her left hand, he reached her right to the window latch and tried to free it. For several anxious seconds, the latch resisted, then finally began to give way.
There was a quick movement behind her. She spun as the bedroom door burst open, and the light from a handheld spotlight lifted into her eyes.
A shout came from the doorway. "Freeze, police!"
Instinctively, her hands began to come up. Later, the officer would say that the photos squeezed in Angelina's left hand looked like a gun.
There was a flash from the officer's real gun and a loud bang rang in the closed room. Angelina fell backward as a bullet passed through her heart and buried into the wall behind her. Pain exploded in her chest, and as Angelina lifted a hand to press against the wound, she sank first to her knees, then fell the rest of the way to the floor, landing on her back. The officer rushed forward, then hurriedly began calling for an ambulance into his portable radio.
And as Angelina's consciousness began to fade, she heard the mocking laughter of the voice. Please God, she thought, just let me die this time.
Finally, one day, his mother died. She was the last one who actually talked to him, who knew him without judging him. Her voice could no longer calm him when he suffered the nicks and cuts of everyday life. She no longer filled his holidays with thoughtful cards and familiar, delicious food. His mother was gone, and he was alone, absolutely.
His lonely moments grew bitter. The thoughts of suicide that had flitted at the edges of his consciousness grew more insistent, more real. Instead of vague fantasies about what it would be like when he was gone, instead of idly pondering who, if anyone, would sign the guest book at his funeral, he began to plan, to contemplate when and how.
Jonathan chose as the date the eve of his fortieth birthday, the symbolic end of his youth. Really, the choice was made because the date was close at hand, and he did not want to be as pathetic a forty-something as he was a thirty-something.
His method was absolute, and sure. He did not want to wake up in a hospital with some stranger in a blue, disposable uniform telling him that science had brought him back from the edge of death. No, he squeezed himself into his bathtub and put the business end of a shotgun between his teeth and pulled the trigger. In an instant, he too was gone from life.
The next, timeless moment, however, revealed some nasty truths. First, he discovered that his consciousness had survived, despite what he had done to his body. There was life after death. Second, he felt the presence of the vast super-consciousness that was the Creator. And third, he discovered to his horror that this Creator would not reward this little man for prematurely ending the life that the Creator had bequeathed him. Though he had lived a clean and otherwise honorable life, Heaven did not open its pearly gates to him. He would not be allowed to die, not until God was finished with him.
Thus began the story of a fallen soul.
* * * * *
She woke with a start, uncertain of where she was. She lay spread-eagled on her back, her wrists and ankles bound to the metal frame of a bed. Dried spittle traced lines down from the corner of her mouth. The room, bright white with large fluorescent light fixtures in the ceiling, smelled of the remnants of urine and barf, mixed in with the odor of the industrial strength disinfectant used to clean it up.
Her mind swirled, trying to gather the details of her surroundings through hazy senses. She blinked to clear the fog from her sight. A hospital room? No, it was too dirty, and no medical equipment was in sight. But she was wearing a patient's white robe, and a blue plastic identity band around her left wrist. Her body appeared to her thin and shriveled, far smaller than she remembered.
Her memory, too, was fragmented. She remembered trying to kill herself, remembered the taste of the cold steel of a shotgun in her mouth. She remembered willing her finger to pull the trigger to end her life. But for some reason, she had failed. She knew that from the bite of the leather straps as they held her in limbs in place. She knew it from the unpleasant odors that she smelled with each rasping, dry-throated breath that she inhaled. She was alive, and she knew that those who had bound her to this bed would not let her try to kill herself again.
Then, as she searched her memory, she realized there was one very important detail missing--her name. What was her name? Her brow furrowed with the effort to remember something so basic, yet so elusive.
Finally, in her frustration, she blurted the question out loud. "Dammit, what's my name?" Her voice rang harshly throughout the room.
A deep, male voice answered. "Your name was Jonathan. Your name is now Angelina." There was a low, malicious chuckle.
Angelina could not see who was speaking. She craned her head from side to side, trying to locate the speaker. But the door was closed and the tiny, rectangular room appeared empty.
In a timid tone, she asked, "Hello? Who's there?"
The disembodied voice replied, "I and my identity will remain a mystery to you for now, my dear." The voice grew quiet and more uncertain. "At least, until I discover who has taken my Angelina away from me and given her to you. And, more importantly, why." There was a rustling sound behind the head of the bed. "Until we meet again, here is a little something to remember me by."
The room suddenly chilled, and a shadow passed between Angelina's face and the ceiling light. A wave of revulsion swept through her as the presence dipped toward her face. She twisted against the bindings that held her, resisting its approach. The shadow brushed her lips with any icy, nauseating touch that caused her stomach to dry-heave and her throat to gag. She retched, gasping for air.
Then, in the next instant, the presence was gone. The pressure around Angelina's chest vanished, and her breathing steadied into deep heaves as she drew fresh air into her lungs. The room recovered its warmth, and she again heard the low whir of the ventilation fan over her bed.
As she recovered her composure, she could not understanding what had just happened. Time passed in the windowless room, and confused thoughts swirled through her mind. Angelina? The voice said that was her name, but it did not seem right. The other name, though, was more familiar. Jonathan. She recognized it, but she could not place when she had heard it before.
A door opened behind her and light footsteps approached. A black woman in a white nurse's uniform leaned over her, scowling. "Quiet today, huh? That's unusual for you, you little bitch." Her voice was full of contempt. She began to adjust and straighten out the sheets on the bed, tugging at them as if she cared more about the wrinkles in the fabric than the patient strapped to the bed.
Angelina frowned. Why did this woman dislike her so much? What had Angelina ever done to her? She could not remember. Angelina tried to speak, but at first her throat was too dry. Finally, she managed to croak, "I'm sorry."
That stopped the nurse. She said, "Sorry? I didn't think you knew that word. At least, I've never heard you apologize before."
Angelina shook her head, swallowing to moisten her mouth and throat. She whispered, "Before? I don't know what you mean. We've never met."
The nurse stared at Angelina for a moment. Then, more to herself than her patient, she said, "I'm going to get Doctor Davis."
Angelina listened to the nurse shuffle out the door, then flexed her wrists and ankles, testing the leather straps binding her to the bed. She mumbled, "Okay. I'll wait here."
* * * * *
An hour later, Angelina was sitting on the edge of her bed, a thermometer wedged underneath her tongue. Doctor Davis, a balding middle-aged man wearing a white robe and a stethoscope around his neck, looked at his patient with wary curiosity. "You know," he told her as he pulled the thermometer from her mouth, "this is the first time I've evaluated you without you trying to stab me with whatever you could get your hands on."
Angelina shrugged. That did not sound like anything she would do. "I don't remember."
Doctor Davis pulled a small flashlight from his shirt pocket and checked each of her eyes, then the inside of her mouth. "In fact," he continued softly, "I don't ever remember you ever being this calm. How do you feel?"
"Fine, I guess," she replied, her fingers aimlessly tugging at a loose strand of her wild head of sandy hair. "I mean, I'm not in pain or anything. I just feel real dirty, like I haven't taken a shower in ages." She crinkled her nose in disgust.
Doctor Davis nodded. "Yes, my dear. You do smell rather badly. But that's what happens when you are a bad girl and we have to strap you to the bed. And, Angelina, you have been very naughty during your stay here."
Angelina gazed up at him in disbelief. "Really? What do you mean?"
The doctor's brow furrowed. "Don't you know?"
Angelina shook her head. "No. What have I done?"
Doctor Davis took a deep breath. He looked at the nurse standing behind him for help, but she only shook her head back at him. He turned back to his patient. "Well, let's start with what you do know. What do you remember?"
She frowned as she concentrated. "Actually, I don't remember very much at all. I remember putting the barrel of a gun in my mouth. I thought I pulled the trigger. Then, the next thing I knew I was here And this voice, this man I didn't recognize, told me my name was Angelina." She shook her head. "No, actually, he told me I used to be called Jonathan, then he said I am now Angelina. Which doesn't make sense. Then, he was gone. The next thing that happened was the nurse came." She gestured toward the nurse, who actually flinched as Angelina's eyes met hers. "Then, she went and got you."
Doctor Davis frowned, and his tone grew more insistent. "What else? Do you know why you're in here?"
She looked up into his face, and uncertainty crept into her voice. "Because I tried to kill myself?" The corner of her lips twisted into a nervous smile, hoping that she had given the right answer.
The nurse in the corner made a derisive snort, but the doctor ignored her. He straightened and said, "No, you're in here because you killed your parents and brother. Because a judge said you were legally insane, and not responsible for your actions. Frankly, this moment, I agreed with that diagnosis."
That stunned Angelina. "No, no," she protested, "I didn't kill my parents! That's impossible!" She held her head in her hands as she searched her mind for memories that seemed just out of reach. "Plus, I don't think I ever had a brother."
"No, I assure you that is why you are here," the doctor insisted. "And this man who spoke to you? Who was it?"
Angelina shrugged, her voice distant. "I don't know. He seemed to know me, though. I thought you could tell me."
Doctor Davis turned toward the nurse. "Was anyone else in here, Nurse?"
She stepped forward. "No, absolutely not, Doctor. I was at my station all morning, and the key to this room was there the whole time. I came in to check her bindings, and she was looking at me with this strange expression."
The doctor asked, "Strange?"
"Yes," she answered. "It was the first time Angelina didn't look like a crazed animal. She looked up at me, well, almost like she was normal."
Their patient interrupted. "What are you people talking about? I don't know what you think, but I'm not a nut."
Together, they turned back to face her. They stared for a moment, until the doctor broke the silence. "We don't use the word 'nut' around here," he said. "But it appears you do need to be reevaluated over the next few days." He patted Angelina on the shoulder. "Until then, do you think you can be a good girl? Nurse Judy here will get you cleaned up. We can talk again tomorrow."
The eyes of the two women met, and the nurse grimaced in distaste of her patient. Doctor Davis left the room, leaving them alone.
After an uncomfortable moment of silence, Nurse Judy said, "Alright, you heard the doctor. Let's go." She grabbed a towel and a fresh white patient's robe from the top of a nearby dresser, then herded Angelina toward the door. They entered the hallway, and Nurse Judy grabbed Angelina by the upper arm with a tight grip to lead her toward the showers.
The others in the hallway, female patients and staff, parted as they passed. Some looked at Angelina with undisguised hatred, others with wide-eyed fear. Angelina stared back at them. She did not recognize any of them, or this place.
They reached the communal showers, and Nurse Judy halted Angelina. "Wait one second," the nurse commanded. She swung open the door, and Angelina could hear water flowing in the large tiled room around the corner. Nurse Judy called out, "Ladies, wrap it up! Angelina's going to take a shower!"
There were a couple of surprised gasps from the interior room, and the sound of the water ended abruptly. After a moment, two middle-aged women appeared, with towels loosely covering the front of their bodies. Drops and wet hair matted against their heads appeared, one with soap suds still on her arms. Neither looked at Angelina as they hustled out into the hallway. Angelina could not understand why they were so afraid of her. She did not even know them.
Angelina walked slowly in the first room, an open, white-tiled washroom with a row of sinks, the air thick with warm moisture and the smell of shampoo and soap. The large mirrors were fogged over, moisture condensing into thin streamers that dripped in thin lines down to the counter. Angelina paused for a moment to look at the faint, blurred outline of herself in a mirror, but could only see the broad outlines of her thin body and her colors--the dirty blond of the hair around her head, and the gray of her hospital blouse. She felt a twinge of curiosity. Strange, she thought, she could not remember what she looked like.
But the other image in the mirror closed the distance quickly between them. Angelina felt Nurse Judy's hands press into the small of her back. Nurse Judy growled, "Come on, missy, get on with it. I've got other things to do today."
Angelina took a few halting steps forward, reaching the opening into the shower room. She stopped and faced Nurse Judy, and her cheeks flushed with her embarrassment. Was she supposed to take off her clothes in front of this woman? That did not seem right. She opened her mouth to object, but the glare from Nurse Judy's eyes stopped her. Angelina gulped, her throat suddenly dry.
Well, Angelina thought, if she had to take a shower, she would. She loosened the knot on the cord which held her loose-fitting sweat pants around her waist. She slipped the fabric from around her hips, letting the pants drop to the floor, leaving behind only tight-fitting white panties. Her fingers gingerly released the buttons down the front of her blouse, then twisted her shoulders to slide it from her arms. It plopped on the floor behind her.
That left a bra behind, a simple white bra with shoulder straps, but Angelina stared down at it as if it were some alien creature wrapped around her body. For a moment, she tugged at it, unsure of how to remove it.
Nurse Judy groaned, "Oh, for heavens sake!" She reached behind Angelina and unclasped the bra's fastener. "I swear you enjoy tormenting me."
The straps slid from Angelina's shoulders and the bra joined the other clothes on the tiled floor. Angelina was too distracted to reply, staring down at the curves of her breasts. They looked natural enough, round and full as appropriate to the young woman she was, but they looked out of place to Angelina, as if they belonged to someone else and it was wrong for her to be appraising her own body.
After a few moments, Nurse Judy finally coughed her impatience. Angelina started and flushed with embarrassment, suddenly remembering that she was not alone. Only her panties remained, and this time Angelina held her chin up as she inserted her fingers into the waistband and slid them down the length of her legs. She stepped out of them and used the tip of a toe to lift the panties onto the pile of the other clothes. The mystery of what the removal of the panties had revealed would have to wait until later.
Angelina felt her nakedness, shivering in the mix of the humid warmth of the shower room and the cold, fresh air drifting in through the doorway behind her. But she did not have more than a couple of seconds to hesitate before she felt the firm hand of Nurse Judy press into the small of her back. Angelina stepped through the threshold into the shower room.
The room itself was normal enough, with a row of shower heads and pairs of hot and cold knobs jutting out from the wall, and thin half-partitions between each stall. Angelina walked over to one of the middle stalls, which had a small tube of shampoo and a sudsy bar of soap on a small metal rack. Holding herself out of the line of the showerhead, she turned on the water and adjusted the knobs until the temperature of the spray on the back of her hand felt warm and inviting.
Finally, Angelina turned her face upwards toward the water pulsing from the showerhead, and stepped into the spray. The water enveloped her, soaking into her hair and running down her face and over her shoulders into the creases of her body. After enjoying the sensation for a few seconds, she picked up the tube of shampoo and squeezed a small dab into the palm of one hand, then began to rub the shampoo into the stringy strands of her hair. After rinsing the suds out, she picked up the soap and made a thick lather in the palms of her hands. She continued to clean herself, starting with her face and moving down her body and limbs. Soon, she felt the grunge and oil and funk that had coated her body washing away, as if she were sloughing off a dead outer shell, leaving virgin skin and a new body behind. Angelina closed her eyes and enjoyed the sensations that swept over and through her. The simple act of taking a shower had taken on the power of a baptismal, and rapture filled her soul. In her cleaning the filth from herself, Angelina was reborn.
Finally, a voice behind her grated with impatience. "Okay, Okay. Don't start getting off, sister. Not with me watching." It was only when Nurse Judy reasserted her presence that reality rushed back to Angelina--the sound of water spattering on the tile, the sensation of the droplets raining on her head, the sound of the overhead ventilator fan trying to cleanse the dense air from the room. Reluctantly, Angelina twisted the knobs closed, and her moment was over.
Angelina folded her arms across her chest, hiding her nakedness as she turned to face Nurse Judy. She flinched as a towel arced across the distance between them, landing on Angelina's right shoulder. Gingerly, Angelina began to dab the moisture from her face, and awkwardly rubbed water from her skin under Nurse Judy's watchful glare. In contrast to the warm glow she had felt only moments before, now, in the harsh light of Nurse Judy's eyes, Angelina felt tiny, frail and alone.
Soon, Angelina had been wrapped within a thin, smooth cotton robe that barely covered her torso, and her bare feet were padding down the hallway back to her room. She had no regrets about living the filthy clothes that had covered her behind in the shower room, but what she had on then felt paper thin as she walked among the strangers who parted to let her pass. Self-conscious, she kept her head down and avoided their eyes, letting Nurse Judy's hands push her this way and that until the door to her room clanged shut behind her, and she was alone again.
The old sheets to her bed had been removed and a new pile sat waiting on the mattress. Angelina remade her bed, then plucked out new underwear and a blouse and sweatpants, bland but clean, from the dresser. She redressed, then crawled between the sheets to recover warmth back into her limbs. At last, she closed her eyes, and sleep came to her.
Time passed and night fell, taking the light from Angelina's room. No clock was there to measure the moment when her slumber ended and her eyes fluttered open, greeted by an empty blackness. As the fog of sleep faded from her mind, she became aware of an unpleasant, sickly odor. For a moment, she wondered if it was an echo of her own former, foul stench, but a twist of her head pressed a strand of her hair between her nose and the pillow. The hair smelled clean, with a trace of shampoo. No, it was not her, but it was a familiar, though foul, smell.
As if in answer to her confusion, a dark, disembodied male voice echoed in the room. "Greetings, my dear. I see you've been scrubbed and gotten some clean clothes. That should help you in your new situation."
A bolt of fear shot down Angelina's spine. It was the voice that had spoken to her hours earlier, when she had been still bound to the bed frame. She demanded in a high, breathy tone, "Who are you? What do you want?"
The voice chuckled, a low laugh that clearly enjoyed her fright and confusion. "Believe it or not, I am your friend--the only one who can tell you who you truly are, and what you are doing in this place. These are questions, I believe, that have, or will, be troubling your pretty little head. Am I right?"
Friend? Angelina doubted that, instinctively distrusting the speaker. But the voice was correct. Everything that had happened that day seemed too new, almost as if she had only begun to live her life within the past twenty-four hours. That did not seem possible. After all, she could speak English (and knew she could read and write, even if she had not done it yet). She knew Nurse Judy was a nurse, and Doctor Davis was a doctor, and what those roles meant. She knew the shame of being dirty and of being naked, that she needed to be clean and clothed to be a good girl. No new-born babe would know any of this. It would take years of learning, even if she could not remember it.
And, most important, Angelina knew she was insane. She had to be. That was why she was a patient in mental hospital. That was why everyone she had met either loathed or was afraid of her. She did not doubt the justice of her confinement. She must be a very sick person, even though she could not remember the things she had done.
Still, it was uncomfortable for her to have this strange man in her room knowing more about her than she did herself. At last, in a quiet, almost timid voice, she answered, "My name is Angelina. I'm a patient in a mental hospital."
In reply, the other was angry, impatient. "Yes, yes. Your full name is Angelina Maria Hernandez. But I was the first to tell you your new name, remember? It was easy enough to guess the rest." There was a pause, and Angelina felt the presence gather itself within the darkness, draw itself closer to her. The foul stench in her nostrils grew more intense. Angelina drew the sheets closer to herself and coiled her body into a tight little ball. She was afraid.
When the voice spoke again, it was only inches from her face. "The real mystery is this--not who you are, but who you were. Who were you before you came to be Angelina?"
But she already knew the answer. The voice had told her that, too. In a whisper, she said, "Jonathan. You said I used to be Jonathan." She spoke the name quietly, because some instinct told her that was a secret that she should not have known.
"That's right," the voice said, its command restored. "Your name used to be Jonathan Anthony. You died on the eve of your fortieth birthday. What else do you remember about your former life?"
"Nothing," she lied. She could not repeat what she had told Doctor Davis of her memory of the cold steel of a gun in her mouth and of her act of pulling the trigger. It was part of some great crime, though she could not recall the other particulars. But the memory was seared on her soul as if she were branded by it for life.
The presence, for its part, did not call her on her lie, even though she sensed it already knew the truth. "All right, then. What of the present? How did you get to be here?"
Despite her fear, Angelina began to get angry. She knew the voice was toying with her. "I don't know. You're so smart, you tell me."
The voice mocked her with his low laughter. "As you wish, my dear. You are what some humans refer to as a 'walk-in'. The soul that used to inhabit that body, the real Angelina, was my pet. In her early teens, she was diagnosed by a so-called psychiatrist as being a paranoid schizophrenic. After all, she was hearing a voice, one that was telling her to do things she otherwise would not do as a nice young girl. Her first doctor gave her medication which helped her to ignore my demands. Then, about two years ago, when she was seventeen, she felt well enough to stop taking her pills. I returned to her life, and I was again her mentor and she was the pupil."
As the voice went on, Angelina felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She could not imagine this malicious entity, whomever or whatever it was, having control of anyone. But she stayed silent as the thing continued.
It spoke slowly, relishing its tale. "Then, one day, I tested her fidelity. I commanded her to kill her brother. And she did, stabbing him with a butcher knife while he peeled an orange over the kitchen sink. When her mother found them and tried to call the police, my little Angelina killed her as well. Later, her father returned home from work, and she drove the knife into his back as he was taking off his jacket in the living room. And it was all perfectly sensible to her at the time, because I had told her to do it."
The empty, black silence that followed was almost more frightening than hearing the voice speak. After a moment, Angelina asked in a timid whisper, "Then what happened?"
"Well," the voice answered, "I had promised my dear Angelina that no harm would come to her, that she would be taken care of for the rest of her life if she did as I asked. And I was right. She was insane, you see, not responsible for her actions. All the doctors agreed. So, they placed her in here until she was well, or for the rest of her life. Which amounted to the same thing."
Angelina was horrified. This voice, this evil thing, had murdered three people and ruined the life of a young girl. Strangely, though, she believed every word. It sounded like the truth, and Doctor Davis had already told her a much shorter version of the story. She had to know the answer to another question. "But I didn't do any of that," she insisted. "I know that in my heart. What happened to the real Angelina?"
"Gone, forever," it replied. It actually sounded sad, if that were possible. "She has been taken from me, replaced by you. That is a walk-in. Your soul has been placed into Angelina's body, to live out the rest of her life."
Angelina grew indignant. "Well, if you think I'm going to be your puppet, you can stop right now. There's no way I would ever let someone like you tell me what to do!"
The voice sounded resigned. "I know. That is the point. You are more independent than Angelina ever was. In fact, it was a rash act of selfishness on your part that led to your current state."
That startled Angelina. "Rash act? What do you mean?"
"Your suicide, of course. Come now. You know exactly what I am talking about."
Angelina did, though she did not want to admit it. The gun in her mouth, the act of pulling the trigger, was her only memory of her former life. She simply could not remember the inevitable outcome of doing such a thing.
Tears welled in her eyes, and she began to cry. As the enormity of what she had done finally began to sink in, her sobs became more intense, and her breaths came in short, hard coughs as she wept into her pillow.
And only the voice in the night was there to hear her sorrow. Finally, it grew bored, and it left Angelina to drown in her own misery.
* * * * *
Over the next few weeks, Angelina gradually made up her mind to break out of the mental hospital. It was not her first impulse. As she tried to figure out who and where she was, she tried to be nice. She wanted the people at the hospital--the doctors, the staff, the other patients--to stop being afraid of her. She did what she was told, went where the authority figures told her to go, and Angelina smiled in meek submission the whole time. In her heart, she knew she was a good, kind person, and everyone else would realize that, eventually.
But the voice that visited her in the night kept reminding her that she was merely a fake Angelina, an ex-middle aged man wrapped within a young girl's body. She tried not to listen, waving the voice away is it were a bee buzzing around her head, trying to ward it off before she felt its sting. She instinctively distrusted it--it was a malicious, nauseating spirit that hid in the shadows, and Angelina knew without having to be told that it had preyed on others before her. She could not trust anything it said to her.
Yet the truth of one thing the voice had told her became all too obvious. The decision-makers in the hospital would never let her leave, ever. In her talks with Doctor Davis, Angelina kept insisting that she was much better, that she was calm and in control of herself, that she wouldn't hurt a fly. Then, Doctor Davis would gently remind her of the disembodied voice that haunted her, that she believed she had been a man who committed suicide only to wind up as a female Hispanic mental patient.
She never denied these things; after all, Angelina was the one who told Doctor Davis about them. She did have to admit to herself, though, that when Doctor Davis repeated her assertions back to her they sounded like the ramblings of, well, a crazy person. It would not be hard for him to imagine that she was still the same wild, truly insane killer of three people. But this Angelina truly was a different person, and she needed professional psychiatric help. "Please," she would beg over and over in their sessions, "Please believe me. Help me understand what's happening to me!"
But Doctor Davis would only cock an eyebrow and lean back into his overstuffed leather chair. "Well, for one thing," he would say in a stuffy, officious tone, "keep taking your medications. And if you keep yourself under control--as you have been--we may start lifting some of the restrictions and give you freer access to the rest of the ward. We'll speak again in a couple of days." Then, Angelina would be escorted back to her tiny room and the door locked behind her. She was alone, at least until the voice visited again.
Then, one night when her spirits were especially low, she felt the familiar sick feeling in her stomach that announced the presence of the voice in the empty blackness of her room. This time, she began the conversation. "Get me out of here," Angelina said.
She could almost feel the voice grinning back at her. "What's this, my dear? Are you actually asking for my help?"
"Yeah," she answered, "I'm fed up with this place. I want out." The spirit's reply was a low, malicious laugh.
Angelina continued, "This is ridiculous. I'm stuck in here for something I didn't do."
The voice sounded sympathetic. "Yes, that is a shame, truly. But tell me, where will you go? What will you do?"
"Live my life," she said. "Do the best I can. Just like everyone else."
"Come now, my dear. You do not expect to merely walk out of here and blend in with the rest of the world."
Angelina shook her head. "No, probably not. But if I stay in here I really will go crazy. So, can you help me?"
The voice took on a hard, cold tone. "Of course, little one, out of respect for the memory of my beloved Angelina. Your wish is my command."
And the presence was gone. Angelina sat on the edge of the bed, shivering with anxiety. What was the bargain that she had just made?
A few minutes later, the presence returned. "All right, my dear. You may go."
Angelina started. "Just like that?"
The voice answered matter-of-factly, "Yes, the way is clear."
Angelina swallowed to clear her suddenly dry throat. She stood and slipped her toes into a pair of hospital slippers, then shuffled toward the door. As she walked, she felt the presence move with her, falling in behind her.
She reached for the door. It should have been locked; it always had been. But this time, when Angelina pulled on the handle, the door slid smoothly inwards. Angelina stared at the open doorway in disbelief.
Finally, Angelina leaned forward and peeked out into the hallway. It was empty, and eerily quiet. She knew it was the middle of the night, but even in the early hours there were always attendants on duty. This time, though, Angelina did not see anyone.
To the left, there was an open area with several chairs and a couch facing a television. The set was on, tuned to a cable news channel, but the volume was turned off. Angelina crept forward and peered over the top of the sofa. A female nurse was sleeping soundly, curled up on the cushions. Angelina smiled. She gently lifted the white nurse's hat off the sleeping woman and placed it on her head.
Her smile widened into a Cheshire-cat grin. She whispered, "I think I know how to get out of here." The presence, unseen in the glare of the fluorescent lights, smiled with her.
* * * * *
An hour later, Angelina was fully clothed in a white nurse's uniform she had found in a staff room, and driving in the sleeping nurse's car, heading toward the front gate of the hospital. The nurse's name was Michelle Henderson. Angelina knew that from the purse she had stolen from the attendant's station. Angelina felt sorry for taking the purse, Nurse Henderson's hospital security card, and her car. But Angelina needed those things to get away, and she planned to write a polite note apologizing to Nurse Henderson, once she was safely gone.
At that moment, though, a nervous knot in her gut threatened to unload the contents of her stomach. She was doing her best to look the part of a nurse heading home at the end of a shift, but the straggly hair dangling out from beneath her hat and her wild eyes would have given her away during the day. It was a cool night, but perspiration gathered on her forehead. She wondered whether she was supposed to speak to the guard at the gate, whether she needed to show an identification card. That would not help either, because she, a teenage Hispanic, certainly did not look anything like the middle-aged African-American woman in the photo.
But there was no other way. She had to bluff her way through the gate, without attracting attention to herself. Otherwise--well, Angelina did not dwell on what would happen then. In her heart, she was not a violent person, but somebody was going to get hurt.
The car, a small economy car with a tired, rattling engine, glided forward toward the front gate. To the side, there was a small, glassed booth lighted by a yellowish overhead lamp. The guard, a paunchy overweight rent-a-cop well past his prime, was reclining backwards in a chair, his chin resting against his chest. Was he asleep? Angelina could not tell.
As the car rolled up, though, the man seemed to stir. Angelina's breath caught in her throat. She fumbled for the identification card clipped to her blouse pocket. Her fingers finally grasped it, and Angelina pressed it up against the drivers window, placing it between the guard and her face. She braked to slow the car, but she was not going to come to a complete stop if she did not have to. She held her breath, waiting for his reaction.
The guard's brow furrowed in confusion, and he glanced at his watch. Angelina felt a chill run up the length of her spine. Angelina realized he was not expecting someone to be leaving at that hour. He leaned forward, letting the chair plant itself on the floor, and stood up. Angelina hurriedly put the identification card down. She hoped he had not seen the picture.
The guard slid open the door to the booth and motioned for Angelina to stop the car. As she rolled down the car window, Angelina swallowed to clear her suddenly dry throat.
The guard nodded down at her, but his tone was less than friendly. "Evening, miss. Leaving early, are we?"
Angelina managed a weak smile. She answered in a high, tense little girl's voice, "Yes, sir. I don't feel well, so I'm going home before the end of my shift."
He stared at her with no trace of sympathy, but did not seem overly suspicious. He tilted his head to look into the dark interior of the car, first in the back seat then returning to stare silently at Angelina.
The silence grew more uncomfortable by the second. Angelina tried quickly to think of something to say. "I, um. . . Uh, I'm sorry to have woken you up."
The guard's face hardened into a sour grimace. His voice grated when he spoke, "May I see your identification card, miss?"
Suddenly, Angelina knew the game was up. One look at the picture and she knew the guard would know what was happening. Her hand was trembling as she stretched out her arm to hand the guard the nurse's ID. But as he lifted his fingers to take the card from her hand, Angelina let it fall to the ground.
She feigned surprise. "Ooh. I'm sorry!"
The guard growled, then bent over to retrieve it. As he did, Angelina jammed her foot on the car's accelerator. The motor hesitated for an instant, then caught. It revved hard, and the tiny front tires squealed as the car lurched forward. As it sped through the front gate of the hospital, Angelina glanced quickly in the rear view mirror. The guard had taken a couple of steps to chase after her, and his mouth was open, yelling something that Angelina could not hear. Angelina returned her gaze to the street ahead of her. There was no going back.
The neighborhood near the hospital was dirty but deserted, and the blocks went by as Angelina raced ahead. Even though she knew she only had moments before the guard had put the police on her trail, she felt exhilarated. She was free!
Then, she heard a rustling in the darkness in the rear seat, and sensed the familiar, nauseating presence of the disembodied voice even before it spoke. In an undisturbed, smooth tone, the voice spoke, "Brava! Well done, my dear! Granted, you would never have escaped your room but for me. But to reach this point is impressive."
Angelina's relief turned into sudden rage. "Your help. Please. Why wasn't the guard asleep?"
The voice chuckled. "Come now. You do not expect me to do everything for you, do you?"
"No," Angelina shot back. "But if you're going to keep pestering me, do more than just watch."
The voice laughed, a malicious giggle that mocked Angelina's anger. "Well, my dear, if you insist on my help, I offer it to you. Wholeheartedly."
As she focused on speeding ahead as fast as she dared, Angelina winced. The voice sounded a little too smug. But she also knew she needed help. Otherwise, her escape would turn into a very short trip.
Angelina said, "Alright, how about finding somewhere for me to hide? I can't race around like this for too much longer."
"True enough. And I have just the place." Angelina heard genuine amusement in the voice. Her instincts rang with alarm.
Even so, Angelina slowed the pace of her flight, and the voice directed her one way, then another. Soon, she was out of the poorer section of the city, heading into a better residential neighborhood. And, to that point, she had yet to see the flashing lights of a police cruiser. Perhaps, she thought, her luck would continue to hold.
Finally, the voice directed her to pull the car into the driveway of a darkened one-story white ranch house. As the headlights reflected from the garage door into her eyes, a shudder ran through Angelina. Even though the house was similar to the ones around it, and no different from other houses in the subdivision, this place in particular seemed oddly familiar to her. Why had the voice chosen this place?
But there was no time to follow through on that thought. Angelina asked quickly, "Is there anybody in there? Can I hide here?"
The voice was calm and unhurried as it answered. "Yes, my dear. No one has lived here for some months now, and the couple that bought it will not be here for another couple of weeks. In fact, the garage is empty and the side door is open. You can put the vehicle inside, if you wish." Angelina could hear the voice smiling as it finished. "Believe me. This place is perfect for you."
Angelina could only hope the voice was telling the truth. She quickly exited the car and ran inside the garage. After taking a few seconds in the darkness to locate the button for the opener, she succeeded in raising the large front door. She drove the car inside and shut it off, closing the door behind it.
Angelina exhaled her relief, grateful for the sudden silence. She gently closed the side door to the garage behind her and crossed the short distance to the facing side of the house. Angelina stood on a step and peered through one of the windows in the kitchen door.
The interior was silent and empty. There was no table and no chairs in the nook, and the countertops were bare of any appliances. There were bare spaces where a refrigerator and range would have stood, and a couple of the kitchen cabinets were open, as if someone had looked inside and not bothered to close them. Angelina nodded in satisfaction. So far, so good.
The first problem was how to get in without breaking anything. Angelina did not want to attract any more attention to herself from the neighbors than she already might have. But the door was locked.
She looked above the door and to each side, searching for any sign of a hidden key. The voice, she knew, was still with her, though it had gone strangely silent. She would have to find her own way inside.
Then, a thought occurred to her. The key was not right there by the door. It was in the back yard, hidden inside the lid of a bird feeder. She shook her head, wondering how she knew that. There was only one way to test the theory.
The light from the street spilled between the house and the garage, granting Angelina a thin lighted pathway into the back yard. She walked tentatively into the damp grass, her eyes looking for a small rectangular shape mounted at eye level on an iron pole. Then, to her right, she saw the darkened shape that she was looking for. It was a small wooden bird feeder with a peaked lid. It was empty of seeds, probably unfilled since the last person that had lived her had left. Angelina pushed the lid open, and retrieved a key from near the hinge--precisely where she thought it would be.
She returned to the kitchen door and the key smoothly unlocked the deadbolt. Angelina quickly entered, and carefully closed the door behind her.
For several seconds, Angelina stood there and held her breath, listening for any sounds. She did not completely trust the voice's assertion that the house was vacant, and she let her senses test the interior. But she heard no sounds, and her instincts betrayed no hint that anyone else was in the house. Except the voice, which Angelina knew was an unseen presence by her side.
At last, Angelina stepped further into the house, moving from the kitchen into the living room. The room was lighted through the front window by the lights shining in the street, making it bright enough to see. This room, too was empty of any furniture, even though the carpet showed still betrayed signs of where a couple of chairs, a coffee table, a home entertainment unit and a sofa had once rested. Strangely, Angelina could picture in her mind how the room had once looked, and she easily matched up the furniture in her mental image with the marks on the carpet.
Angelina kept moving, passing into a short hallway. Several doors opened onto the hallway--two bedrooms, one bathroom and a door leading to the basement.
For a moment, Angelina stood there, deciding which room to enter. The bathroom door stood open on her right, but even though she felt a slight urge to use the toilet, she stayed in the hallway. Of all the rooms around her, the bathroom was the one room that sent a foreboding chill through her. The darkness in there was particularly deep and frightening. She would wait until daylight before attempting to enter.
A less threatening room was the one next to the bathroom, the small rear bedroom. Angelina entered, but there was not enough light to see anymore than a couple of feet into the room. Still, Angelina decided that this would be her hiding place for the night.
She closed the door behind her and flipped on the wall switch. The ceiling light turned on, filling the room with a sudden, bright illumination. It took a couple of seconds for her eyes to adjust.
This room was also empty, with only marks in the carpet to show where the furniture had once stood. But Angelina had no trouble picturing the room as it once was. She imagined the full size bed and blue quilted comforter, the night stand on which had once rested an electric clock radio and standing lamp. On the other side, there had been a computer desk with a pullout keyboard drawer, and a small bookcase to its right. She could even imagine the pictures and plaques that had hung on the now-empty hooks on the wall.
For the first time, Angelina began to wonder about the ease with which these images had come to her. She began to be more certain that she had been to this house before. But when, she wondered.
She moved to the closet and slid open the louvered doors. The shelves were bare and only a couple of empty wire hangers dangled from the rod. Angelina's eyes wandered down to the closet floor.
It was a shoe box with a rubber band wrapped around it. It looked perfectly ordinary, but Angelina stared at it as if it were a coiled snake about to strike her. She wanted to reach down and take it, but was afraid to do it.
Suddenly the voice, which had never left her side, spoke softly in her ear. "Yes, my dear. Take it. No one wants what is in that box."
Angelina whispered in reply, "What do you mean?"
"Simply that anything of value has already been taken," the voice said. "That box contains only memories."
Angelina sank to the floor and tucked her legs underneath her. She gingerly lifted the shoebox and pulled off the rubber band. She took one final, deep breath, and lifted off the lid.
The box was full of photographs and slides, bundled together with thin rubber bands. Angelina picked one small stack and began sifting through the photos.
One was a thin, teenage boy with a beaming smile holding a black Labrador puppy. On the back of the photo, written in a careful feminine handwriting, was a date, "8/2/74". Another picture labeled "Xmas 1974" showed the boy in front of a decorated Christmas tree, with smiling parents on either side. The father was a graying, overweight man with a warm, friendly face wearing thick black plastic glasses; the mother was a short, younger woman with a round face and loving eyes.
Angelina wiped her face with the back of a hand as a tear began to trickle down her cheek. She kept flipping through the pictures, gently replacing each bundle as she moved through the rest of the shoe box. Her emotions swelled within her as she followed the progression of the young man through the succeeding years of photos--through high school, including the well-documented prom and graduation, through college, through his first job and first new car. And mixed in through it all were the boys parents, though at some point in the 1980s the pictures of the father stopped, and only the mother continued to appear. Finally, she stopped appearing as well, and finally the pictures themselves seemed to peter out and stop about the year 2000. By that time, Angelina was openly crying, her quiet sobs echoing softly within the bedroom.
Finally, she addressed the unseen voice. "Damn you. Why did you bring me here?"
The voice enjoyed its answer. "Well, my dear, you needed to hide. Why not take you to a place you felt comfortable in?"
Angelina's voice grew angry. "But this was Jonathan's house. I'm not Jonathan any more."
The voice was smug. "Come now. Weren't you the least bit curious about the man you used to be?"
Angelina replied loudly, "No!" Her voice softened. "I mean, yes, a little. But I never would have gone to the place where I had killed myself!" She stared at the wall that divided the bedroom from the bathroom and shuddered. For a moment, she could again taste the memory of gunmetal in her mouth.
Finally, she shouted at the voice. "Go away! Get lost!"
The voice chuckled its derision. "Careful, my precious. We are not alone."
Suddenly, Angelina remembered the brightness of the room. In a panic, she realized that there were no curtains on either of the rooms windows. Any nosy neighbor could see the light shining in the supposedly empty house.
Angelina quickly stood and turned off the light, then retreated into the open closet. She calmed her breath and listened, gripping a couple of the photos tightly in her right hand.
For a moment, she did not hear anything. Then, to her horror, she heard the quiet creaking of slow footsteps on the wooden floor of the hallway.
In desperation, she stood and glided across the room to the closest window. Switching the photos to her left hand, he reached her right to the window latch and tried to free it. For several anxious seconds, the latch resisted, then finally began to give way.
There was a quick movement behind her. She spun as the bedroom door burst open, and the light from a handheld spotlight lifted into her eyes.
A shout came from the doorway. "Freeze, police!"
Instinctively, her hands began to come up. Later, the officer would say that the photos squeezed in Angelina's left hand looked like a gun.
There was a flash from the officer's real gun and a loud bang rang in the closed room. Angelina fell backward as a bullet passed through her heart and buried into the wall behind her. Pain exploded in her chest, and as Angelina lifted a hand to press against the wound, she sank first to her knees, then fell the rest of the way to the floor, landing on her back. The officer rushed forward, then hurriedly began calling for an ambulance into his portable radio.
And as Angelina's consciousness began to fade, she heard the mocking laughter of the voice. Please God, she thought, just let me die this time.